Merry Christmas!

I know it's not Christmas yet, but it is beginning to feel like it!

Peek-a-Boo

Despite drawing The First Presidency last year, it was only yesterday when I finally framed them and hung them up.
The lights get in the way if you try to see them from the other room...So they are just for the table. And it only took us 2 attempts to get them at the same height.
I am grateful for our Prophet, President Monson, and his counselors. They gave a great Christmas devotional on Sunday. Even though I was pretty tired and in and out of it during the talks (and especially during the music), I could feel their spirits and am encouraged to focus on the real Christmas spirit and meaning.
"Let it be a time for lifting the lives of those who live in loneliness. Let it be a time for calling our families together, for feeling a closeness to those who are near to us and a closeness also to those who are absent.
"Let it be a time of prayers for peace, for the preservation of free principles, and for the protection of those who are far from us. Let it be a time of forgetting self and finding time for others. Let it be a time of discarding the meaningless and for stressing the true values. Let it be a time of peace because we have found peace in His teachings.
"Most of all, let it be a time to remember the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ, that we may share in the song of the angles, the gladness of the shepherds and the worship of the wise men." - Pres. Monson.

Blushing

Our tomato is finally starting to turn red.

Pizza Pictures

Kalina is our family photographer :) Thankfully she took picture of the pizza competition, because no one else remembered to.

Thanksgiving

So I'm over a week late but I finally got around to uploading my pictures. We had a really great Thanksgiving. We started the holiday off by running the Turkey Trot 10K. This was my first 10K ever! It went pretty well...(ps. Thanks Kalina for the above picture, I stole it off your blog...)I also found out that I close my eyes when I'm running...?
After the race, we enjoyed three days with Mark's family...smoked turkeys, deal hunting, pizza competition, variety show, picnic in the park, phone comparisons, violin playing (screeching), temple, smoked ribs, street fighter, and a lot of sitting around talking and laughing.
Thanks Charlie, Ann, H, Christina, Char, Olivia, Steve, Kalina and Clark for such a great time!

Kitchen Experiment: Turkey Stock

I do have Thanksgiving pictures - just a few, but I haven't got around to downloading them yet so that will have to be my next post. After our weekend in Spring, Ann sent us home with the smoked turkey carcass. It had quite a bit of meat that we were able to pull off. Mark then came up with the idea to try making our own turkey stock with the rest of the bird's remains. So we tried it out, boiled up the water, veggies, and some seasonings. Mostly just played it by ear and by internet. I honestly wasn't sure how it would turn out. But after straining it and chilling it, the stock looked about like what the internet said it would. After that successful adventure, I decided to actually use the stock. So I made a Turkey Rice Soup using our homemade stock...and it worked! It was actually quite good. I admit I was a little surprised. :)

Fighting Off the Chill

Fall has crept south and finally reached Baytown. While our temperatures have stayed north of 40 degrees, I have acclimated to the warmer climate and I am freezing. While this morning was beautiful and warm, mornings have been very chilly, especially when our floor is almost entirely stone tiles. So Friday night we opened up our fireplace for business.
I'm already looking forward to the next one.